The Doctor's Assistant
by Gryphon117
Summary: Sometimes a helping hand can reach from the unlikeliest of sources.


"...I couldn't do anything."

Asuka Langley-Sohryu lay on her bed and stared at the ceiling. She inspected the painted surface with narrowed eyes, almost as if looking for the smallest of imperfections, but at the same time her eyes gave the impression of staring past the top of her room and towards some place far, far away.

"I couldn't do anything. Just like all those other times."

The Pilot of Evangelion Unit 02 had been existing on a similar loop for some time, now. Asuka would go to school and suffer through it, leave as soon as the last bell rang and head straight for the apartment. She would change into her indoor clothes and barricade herself within her room to lay on the bed until night came, her mind going back to the fight against the Fourteenth time and time again: To the bus-sized bullets bouncing off its AT-Field as if they were pellets, the rockets exploding on target and having about the same effect as a thrown rock, Unit-02, her pride and joy, being effortlessly batted aside as if it were an annoying _doll_ and, finally, being denied her very last attempt at making a difference.

But even if the idea of losing helplessly to the latest Angel was infuriating and frustrating in and of itself, it paled in comparison to what she had watched during the debriefing.

"Four hundred percent sync-rate."

 _He_ had to show up and make things right where she had _failed_.

But not only that, he had to do it while making the battle look _easy_. Showing up in the nick of time for his Big Damn Hero moment and then effortlessly wiping the floor with the Angel she hadn't even managed to _scratch_? And then fighting like a possessed beast, with moves and a combat sharpness that she would have wanted for herself?

It was crystal clear by the footage that the Third Child would have pulled off a singlehanded win had he not run out of battery power when he did. Not that he didn't have a countermeasure in hand for _that one_ , too.

With a loud cry shaking the small room, a cushion flew through the air and crashed into the furthest wall, followed by a second, and then a third. Over the next few seconds, a myriad of different objects joined the growing pile of items until nothing remained on top of the bed that Asuka could reach.

At this juncture, the redhead decided that she'd had enough of lying down and rose back up to her feet, before putting those same feet to work on angrily kicking the piles of discarded magazines that she'd bought over her time as a resident in the Katsuragi household. Asuka punted, punched, threw and howled, using every single item in the vicinity as an outlet for her anger, and as she did, the questions that had hounded her for nearly as much time rang inside her head over and over again.

Where the hell was the ultra-strong AT-Field that NERV's heaviest weaponry had failed to penetrate?! Where did the razor blades that had humiliated her with half a thought go?! _Why_ did the Angel that had shrugged off an N2 warhead to its face suddenly become _a freaking punching bag_ for the Third Child?!

Why did nothing _ever_ stop the Invincible Shinji Ikari?! Could he somehow turn even the mightiest foe into a brain-dead zombie?! Was the universe somehow conspiring into making all her training and effort look bad?!

In time with the thrashing more and more thoughts and arguments ran through the girl's mind, and the fury of her Teutonic rampage only started to abate when the focus of her thinking shifted towards veiled attempts at making herself feel better, denying the facts, and trying to motivate herself forward. And while the arguments and theories she used were many, they steadily became worse and more implausible with each passing try.

Soon enough her introspection came to a point when, desk lamp held on high, Asuka no longer could contemplate anything but the truth: It was _her_ fault. _Her_ failure. What she had seen in the video footage was the Third Child at his finest, and Asuka found herself wanting in comparison. Not only that, but the redhead was certain that wherever the hell he was supposed to be right now, Shinji Ikari was mocking her.

And so, with a roar caught somewhere between desperation and defiance, the lamp flew straight and true towards the picture of smug perfection that Asuka's mind had conjured, effortlessly dispelling it. At the same time, the sound of the appliance shattering into a million pieces managed to bring the enraged redhead back to her senses.

Taking a few seconds to physically recover, the proud pilot addressed her handiwork with wide eyes and more than a fair bit of apprehension. After all, her room, or rather what remained of it, looked like it belonged in a warzone.

"...I need to get out of here." Asuka panted, shaking her head furiously from side to side. "I'll go mad if I don't."

Clutching onto her newfound decision, Asuka grabbed hold of the first set of clothes she could reach and put them on, never even bothering to check if everything matched her usually high standards. She then threw open the door out of her fallen sanctuary and stepped decidedly towards the exit of the apartment, but not before noticing a blinking red light on the telephone.

Curiosity getting the best of her, Asuka walked over, quickly recognizing a few instances of lost calls from Hikari's phone number. Wondering whether she should return the call before leaving, Asuka's mind went back to the one or two times she'd needed to avoid the brunette at school, on the days when Hikari hadn't stormed off towards the hospital as quickly as Asuka herself had.

Her hand hovering over the machine for a few moments, Asuka ultimately shook her head and turned to leave once again. There was no point in talking to Hikari about her troubles, especially when she already had enough on her plate with fretting over the jock. Hikari was probably just worried about Shinji not showing up to school, anyway.

Walking over to the entrance once more, Asuka pressed the corresponding button and had the door slide away, quickly noticing with some surprise that the sun was already well into its journey down towards the horizon. Realising that she must have nodded off for some time during the afternoon, Asuka felt her hands ball into fists at her side, knowing that the day, _this_ day, would soon be over.

"I'm going out." Asuka sharply called out to the rest of the Katsuragi apartment as she usually did, before closing the door and stepping out.

She knew it to be a pointless warning, however. No one but her had been in the so-called home for more than a week, and all signs showed that this particular day wouldn't be any different.

* * *

Deep within the bowels of NERV, Ritsuko Akagi toiled restlessly on her latest assignment. An assignment that she personally believed pointless from a scientific perspective, considering the indisputable failures that the two previous attempts at recovering a person from an Evangelion core had proven to be, but one that she carried forward to the best of her ability, nonetheless.

Ritsuko's pride as a scientist would settle for nothing less than the absolute certainty of a result, after all, and, to be completely frank, many technological evolutions had taken place during the last decade. It was important to note that those same advances did little more than turn a complete impossibility into an infinitesimally small chance of success, though, but even Ritsuko herself had to admit that the Third Child and Unit-01 had proven her abysmally low probabilities wrong a few times before.

Besides, perhaps succeeding against all odds in the recovery of the Third Child would have the even more unlikely effect of earning Ritsuko some affection points with her lover.

 _'...Like_ that _will happen.'_

Allowing herself barely more than a second to sigh and shake her head at her mess of a love life, Ritsuko quickly focused herself back on the task at hand. Flying through report upon report on the failed recoveries of Yui Ikari and Kyoko Sohryu, the head of Project-E took careful considerations to absorb every little bit of useful data while just as quickly dismissing all the obsolete or useless details.

Such was the apparent focus that Ritsuko put on her work, that an outside observer would have more than likely considered the woman to be completely inattentive to the world around her. That claim would have been proven wrong the moment the hiss of the lab's door opening brought a halt to Ritsuko's work, causing a small smile to appear on the woman's face.

"I told you to get some rest, Maya." Ritsuko sternly scolded without taking her attention off the screens. "A tired mind will only bring about mistakes that our schedule can't afford."

Ritsuko had pretty much ordered her steadfast assistant to take a break when her head had begun to threaten a collision with the keyboard before her. That had been roughly four hours ago and, as far as Ritsuko was concerned, that amount of time didn't count as a proper amount of rest for her ward.

Knowing the younger woman, though, Ritsuko very much expected a subdued attempt on calling her a hypocrite for having spent the better part of thirty-six hours subsisting entirely on coffee. The head of Project-E had hoped that her reprimanding tone would be enough to send Maya back to her quarters without debate but, much to the woman's surprise, no meek attempt to argue back came. No steps coming closer, either, so it wasn't like Maya was trying her childish way of silently proving a point, like she'd done some times in the past.

Something wasn't adding up in Ritsuko's mind, so she interrupted her assignment long enough to satisfy her curiosity. Needless to say, the results of her examination were truly something unexpected.

"Second Child? What are you doing here?"

Ritsuko couldn't manage to hide the note of surprise in her voice. Of all the possibilities that had gone through her mind, finding the self-proclaimed Ace Pilot of NERV standing by the door of her laboratory had been close to dead last on her list. Even more surprising, the girl's first reaction was to look equally as confused for a second at finding herself in the lab.

"...I was just walking around." The redhead quietly replied, her perplexity leaving way to curiosity at her immediate surroundings.

"Keep walking, then," Ritsuko promptly responded, turning back to regard her work. "I'm very busy here."

She didn't have time for children. Even less so for children as... _disagreeable_ as the Second had proven to be in the past.

"Are you working on the recovery operation?"

Said child appeared to have different ideas, however, much to the scientist's chagrin.

"Of course I am. Or at least, I'm trying to."

"...Let me help?"

"Don't be ridiculous," Ritsuko finally turned to regard the Second Child once more, deciding to throw all pretence of politeness out the window. "This isn't a daycare. Go back home."

But instead of coming face to face with the stubborn and in many cases bothersome teen that she'd had to suffer in the last few months, as she'd expected, Ritsuko found herself in front of something that gave her pause: the Second Child staring at the floor with a clearly downcast expression, and hugging her body with her left arm in a definite display of unconscious shielding.

The head of Project-E had to blink hard a few times to ensure the lack of sleep wasn't playing tricks on her.

"...Back home?" The Second Child eventually spoke, barely a breath of voice coming out of her. "What's the point of being in a home with no one in it?"

And seemingly out of nowhere, Ritsuko felt a pang of _something_ resonate within her. Perhaps it was empathy due to the knowledge that Ritsuko herself had very little waiting for her back 'home' other than a few cats, as well? Or perhaps it was a case of her motherly instincts acting up and making her feel guilty at the sight of the usually brash and egotistical teenager being evidently distraught, and behaving very much like the comrade she abused on a frequent basis?

No matter the reason why, Ritsuko found herself very surprised to feel a heart in the place where she'd long since assumed a big, black void to be. A heart that was compelling her towards a decision that she found equal times ludicrous and preposterous, yet didn't feel callous enough to ignore.

 _'...I can't believe I'm doing this. Where the hell is Misato when you need her?'_

"Fine, suit yourself." The head of Project-E caved in with an exhausted shake of her head, motioning towards a terminal that was sitting unused. The same one that Maya had been manning a few hours prior. "Put that brain of yours to work on checking those data inputs before you become a bother."

"You...?" Asuka's eyes jumped towards the scientist, her face showing the very definition of surprise. "A-Are you sure?"

And the Second's uncertain stuttering clinched it as far as Ritsuko was concerned. There was something _really_ wrong with the girl today.

"They're low priority, and trivial to fix even if you mess up, but mundane tasks need to be handled just as much as the important ones. Surely a genius of your calibre should have no problem with these?"

"Of course not."

"Good," Ritsuko nodded at the girl's indignant response, pleased to see that the usual Second Child wasn't completely gone. "Get to it, then, or stop wasting my time."

Eyes hardening in determination, the redhead marched forward and sat in front of the terminal, taking a moment to read through the information and figure out the order and priority in which the data was supposed to be entered. Soon enough, the teenager's reading began to be followed by the click-clack of fingers tapping against a keyboard, which Ritsuko took as a cue to focus on her own duties once more.

For the longest time, nothing but the sound of breathing, finger tapping and the occasional cough was to be heard within the laboratory, a single-minded approach to work that Ritsuko was completely fine with. After all, and from her viewpoint, you could gauge the value of a person by how hard they were willing to strive towards a goal. None in her personal research and development team were anything short of ambitious or driven, because how could anyone hope to breach the boundaries of human understanding without being willing to put in the necessary work for it, and be willing to go even further?

To pursue science without the will to excel was the epitome of foolishness, no scientist ever rewrote the laws of their world without ambition by their side. And in that sense, Ritsuko had to give her unexpected assistant credit. Despite clearly not having much of an interest in the deepest reaches of science, the only thing keeping the Second Child's current work pace from being as determined and efficient as Maya's was a lack of proper education in Metaphysical Biology.

Ritsuko could respect that. Which is why the Head of Project-E found herself strangely willing to answer the query that the girl posed, about two or three hours into their work.

"Where's Misato?"

 _'That's something I'd like to know, myself.'_

"She's probably running around the base, harassing and interrogating my team," Ritsuko kept her thoughts to herself, responding without slowing the pace of her work in the slightest. "She's been doing that nonstop for a few days, now."

The Second Child offered no reply to her explanation other than a slightly more zealous pace to her work, which Ritsuko was perfectly fine with. Eventually, however, a second and more subdued question followed.

"...Is he going to be back?"

A question that Ritsuko had been expecting for a while now, in light of the past interactions that had been recorded between the Second and Third Children. If there was one thing that could explain the strange behaviour of her unexpected assistant this day, it was this line of questioning, as far as the Doctor was concerned.

"Are you worried?"

No immediate answer came, other than a more sedate tempo to the Second's finger's taps.

"...I don't know."

"Are you angry?"

This time, the response was far more quick and confident.

"Hell yeah."

"Because of the Third Child's recent form?"

"Of course!"

Unknown to the teenager, Ritsuko allowed herself a smile. Her information gathering was going about as well as could have been expected.

"Care to elaborate?"

"Isn't it obvious?!" The Second exclaimed, abandoning her work fully to turn towards Ritsuko, her voice filled with barely contained anger. "You have a bunch of doctorates, don't you? So you obviously put a lot of work and effort into trying to become the best at what you do, didn't you?"

"Indeed. I made sure to have time for relaxation, but certainly not as much as some of my classmates."

"Exactly!" The Second agreed, leaning closer on her chair. "So how would you feel if after all that work, out of nowhere a random _nobody_ without any kind of studies or practice appeared and started showing you up? Started to make you feel as if all that time you spent trying to make yourself as good as humanly possible meant _nothing_?"

"I'd feel frustrated, I suppose." Ritsuko joined the teenager in pausing her task for a few moments, staring at the girl through the corner of her eye. "Am I correct in thinking that you feel frustrated as well, Second Child? About the Third Child's record synchronization score?"

"Damn right I am!" The redhead heatedly proclaimed, throwing her arms up in the air. "How am I supposed to top that?! And how is _he_ managing that sort of score in any way _fair_?! He didn't _work_ for it! He didn't sacrifice _anything_ for it! So why is _he_ handed all the rewards and the praise on a silver platter?! That's just _wrong_!"

'Wrong' and 'unfair'? A painfully simplistic view in light of the bigger picture of the war against the Angels, but Ritsuko could understand where the girl was coming from. It was a real shame that the world was very rarely fair to those that might have deserved it, indeed, but that was how life worked. Many a time innate talent triumphed over hard work and determination, and that was that.

Not that Ritsuko was advocating that being the case, here. After all, she knew the real reason behind the disparate results on the effort-to-achievement scale as far as the EVAs were concerned, not that such an explanation would ever be made known to the Second Child.

That didn't mean that she couldn't throw the distressed and disheartened girl a bone, though. If for no other reason than figuring that, while not being privy to every little detail in the Commander's so-called Scenario, logic would dictate that a stronger combat performance from the three EVAs at NERV's disposal could only work towards furthering the Commander's goals.

And so, taking that into account and in light of Misato's apparently terrible guardianship, it looked to the Head of Project-E like she would need to take matters into her own hands in order to avoid risking the loss of a third of NERV's combat capabilities.

Good thing that she was completely aware of the forces driving the Second Child forward, not that any person with a passing knowledge of psychology couldn't figure them out even without access to the girl's file. A few carefully chosen and honeyed words should do the trick in keeping the Second Child stable and combat-worthy for the foreseeable future.

"If it's any consolation to you, you'll never be able to achieve that sort of sync-rate with Unit-02," Ritsuko began, her words causing the teenager before her to gasp. "The Third Child's four hundred percent sync-rate and subsequent accident were due to a failure in the limiters of the Test Type, after all. The ones installed into the Production Types aren't liable to that sort of breakdown."

The response the Doctor gathered was as immediate as it was expected.

"So you're saying Shinji cheated?" The Second blurted out, apprehension leaving way to unbridled excitement. "That I could do it too?!"

"For the former, I believe that, in a very simplified manner, you could claim as much," Ritsuko elaborated, making sure to keep her voice as steady and honest as she could. "As for the latter, if you were piloting the Test-Type under the right and unadvisable circumstances, I don't see why you couldn't."

A lie, of course, and a monumental one, at that. But sometimes, a lie or a half-truth was preferable and more productive than cold, harsh veracity; a principle that Ritsuko Akagi herself embodied.

She told herself many lies on a daily basis, after all.

"He cheated...?" The Second Child echoed, taking her time to consider Ritsuko's words. Soon after, she nodded resolutely and with newfound confidence. "Of course he did. This is Stupid Shinji we're talking about, that's the only way he could ever pull something like that off."

And Ritsuko had to fight hard not to roll her eyes at the sight.

 _'So willing to believe that pile of hogwash. Maybe I did overestimate your intelligence.'_

Once again, though, Ritsuko kept her thoughts to herself. The Second was young and naïve, after all, and needless to say, far more damaged than any kid her age should have been. Her enthusiastic reaction was somewhat disappointing but, considering that the girl severely lacked in the maturity department, she could hardly be blamed for it.

Besides, the Second's newfound certainty had the added benefit of putting an end to their conversation, bringing quiet and productivity back to the lab. Something that was a perfectly fine development as far as the Head of Project-E was concerned.

At least, until the sound of light snoring broke Ritsuko's attention away from her work. Curious, she turned towards the other occupant of the room to find the Second Child sprawled over the table, accidentally catching up on lost sleep. Unlike with Maya, the Head of Project-E had failed to spot the symptoms in her second assistant before the fatigue caught up to her.

She must have been exhausted before, Ritsuko speculated, probably since before she entered the laboratory to begin with, something that had the Doctor holding the girl's prior efforts in even higher esteem than before. The newfound insight begged the question of why the redhead hadn't succumbed to fatigue before now, though. Perhaps the knowledge that she wasn't inadequate was all she needed to allow herself to rest?

Yes, that seemed to be the most likely case. The Second was truly such a simple child.

The girl deciding to fall asleep within the lab wasn't something that Ritsuko could consider ideal, however. Putting aside the obvious issues with the quality of the rest or the greater likelihood of catching a minor sickness, explaining the situation to Maya whenever she returned would definitely be slightly annoying.

But Ritsuko would deal with that last issue when the time came. For the time being, though, the Doctor decided that taking a moment to ensure that the Second Child's sleeping arrangements hadn't resulted in a problem with the data feed should take precedence, something that only took her a few moments to swiftly and successfully check.

It was when Ritsuko had cleared her doubts, however, that her eyes happened upon the digital readout of a table clock, set right beside the computer's screen. The scientist noted with some weariness that it was barely ten minutes to midnight, but what really grabbed her attention was the date indicator in one of the corners of the screen.

It read: DEC 4.

"I see. So it was _that_ as well," Ritsuko sighed, her eyes jumping to the sleeping redhead as she easily made the connection. "I'd say that Misato's happy family project is _definitely_ not working out as well as she expected if she's forgetting that kind of details. I suppose I should cut her some slack considering the circumstances, though."

A heavy sigh escaped the Doctor, her mind going back to just how unreasonable and demanding her friend had been these past few days, no matter how many times she'd told her that what they were trying to achieve wasn't anywhere near as simple as diagnosing a cold.

Not that succeeding in this fool's errand would ultimately mean anything for her, anyway. Ritsuko somehow managing to break the laws of physics for the better of everyone around her was always something that was expected, after all, something that wouldn't garner her any special recognition. Not even from the one person that she wanted to hear it from the most.

 _'Heh. That's one scary parallel to someone else I know.'_

The next time her gaze fell upon the slumbering girl, it did so in a softer way than it was customary. And while it would have been a stretch to call it motherly, Ritsuko Akagi's eyes took on a warmer sheen, the kind that the Head of Project-E might have only ever used once or twice around her protégé. For a second, Ritsuko's hand instinctively hovered above the head of the Second Child, before the woman consciously pulled it back.

"...Not that those circumstances will come as any sort of consolation to you now, will they?" The Doctor stated, knowing full well that she spoke the truth. She then grunted softly, before a humourless chuckle found its way to the air around the lab. "Struggling to be noticed, and struggling to earn someone's approval. Maybe we're not so different after all, you and I."

Ritsuko then wondered what she should do now, quickly reaching a decision that she would have certainly not even considered a few hours prior. Waking the girl after she'd finally managed to fall into a tranquil sleep seemed like a poor idea, therefore, steps would need to be taken to make the most out of the situation.

The Doctor slid away the keyboard and other interface elements of the terminal to avoid any possible chance of data loss, and then started to unbutton her lab coat with a clear purpose in mind. After all, and like she'd noted before, it wouldn't do for sickness to incapacitate a third of NERV's standing combat forces.

And so, Ritsuko Akagi draped her lab coat over the sleeping girl's shoulders with a deep sigh, before promptly stepping towards the lab's entrance on a quest to procure yet more coffee and her spare coat faster than Maya's break could end. Knowing her ward, Ritsuko hazarded that time probably wasn't on her side by now but, nevertheless, something compelled her to take a moment at the entrance of the lab and look back with some wonder at the scene that she'd helped construct:

From behind, clad in her lab coat and sprawled over the table like a student that had been cramming for a test until the call of exhaustion, the Second Child looked very familiar. Familiar enough to remind Ritsuko of a scene from days past. A time when she had been younger, innocent, and even more foolish than she was today.

Despite herself, the Doctor couldn't help but smile at the sight.

"Happy birthday, Second Child."

* * *

 **A/N: I realised a few weeks ago that I'd never actually used Ritsuko in a story before, so this snippet is my attempt at remedying that. It also happens to be a nice way to commemorate the 4th of December, so there's that as well.**

 **This is going to be my last planned story in a while, because work beckons and I'm afraid that I have to answer its call. When things die down a little bit in January I do plan to start writing another story but, even then, uploads to FFN will probably not start until I consider the plot to be sufficiently advanced. You'll be able to follow the development of the story in the Sufficient Velocity forums, though, so I urge you to check the link that I'll post in my profile if you're interested in doing so.**

 **In the meantime, maybe some other short stories will appear around these parts, should the muses allow. If and when that happens, I'll see you then, dear readers.**


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